The theft of cargo in the United States has been reported by the FBI as being approximately $30 Billion annually in terms of the actual cargo value and may be as much as ten times that amount if all costs are take into account such as disruptions in the supply chain. C. H. Robinson has been working with the Flemming Cargo Securement and OnAsset companies to reduce this theft through placing hidden sensors and transmitters within pallets of cargo. This solution is destined to fail as thieves become aware of this approach and move to defeat it. Thieves have learned how to defeat other attempted theft countermeasures such as locks and transmitting systems and thus there is a need for a new comprehensive solution to reduce the theft of cargo eventually to zero. The inventions described herein are to solve this heretofore unsolved serious cargo theft problem and achieve zero cargo theft. The implementation of these inventions can be termed The Road to Zero Cargo Theft™ or RtZCT™.
Additional statistics appeared in a recent report (February 2008) published by the International Road Union (IRU) and International Transport Forum (ITF) highlighted that over the period 2000-2005:                1. 17% of all drivers have suffered an attack during the 5-year period investigated        2. 30% of attacked drivers have been attacked more than once        3. 21% of drivers were physically assaulted        4. 60% of the attacks targeted the vehicle and its load        5. 42% of the attacks took place in truck parking areas        6. 30% of the attacked drivers did not report the incident to the police        7. Countries where the highest number of surveyed attacks occurred, per million tonnes of international traffic, are: Romania (5.03/Mt), Hungary (1.31/Mt), and Poland (1.21/Mt)        
According to an EU Parliament report, the Transported Asset Protection Association (TAPA) estimated losses of 8.2 billion Euros across the whole of Europe, which when viewed in full economic loss terms, including cost of replacement goods, re-shipping and reputational damage etc. are a small fraction of the actual damage.
In the US, Cargo theft rose by 4.1% in 2010, to 899 recorded theft incidents, the highest on record. Of the 899 incidents, 724 (81%) were full truckload or container thefts and 31 were warehouse burglaries (3.4%). Violence was involved in 1.3% of the incidents (10 hijackings and two warehouse robberies). This was the second year in a row in which televisions were the product most stolen on record. Of note, 61% of all electronics thefts occurred in the states of California, Florida and Texas.
Of the 899 cargo theft incidents recorded for that year with a known theft type, 724 (approximately 88%) were full truckload or container thefts. Warehouse burglaries declined slightly from 2009 figures, totaling 31 incidents in 2010 compared with 36 the previous year.
Cargo theft can take many forms such as the theft of a tractor and trailer, the theft of the trailer alone or the theft of cargo that is within the trailer. A preferred approach is to steal the trailer by disconnecting it from the tractor while the driver has stopped at a truck stop for a rest, bathroom stop or a meal. It has been reported that the thieves are able to disconnect a trailer and connect it to another tractor, or to steal both the tractor and trailer, in as little as 15 seconds and be on their way before the driver is aware of the event. During the process, the thieves can detect whether the trailer is transmitting information and jam or block the transmission thus preventing a remote site or the driver from learning that a theft is in progress.
The word trailer will be used herein to generally mean not only a trailer in the usual sense as an unpowered vehicle pulled by a powered vehicle but also any container capable of transporting cargo such as ships, barges, train cars and, where appropriate, airplanes. The focus of this invention is movable containers but many of the inventive ideas presented here are also applicable to fixed cargo containers such as storage tanks, warehouses and other buildings.
A further detailed discussion of background information is set forth in the applications listed above and incorporated by reference herein. All of the patents, patent applications, technical papers and other references referenced below and in the parent applications are incorporated herein by reference in their entirety. Various patents, patent applications, patent publications and other published documents are discussed below as background of the invention. No admission is made that any or all of these references are prior art and indeed, it is contemplated that they may not be available as prior art when interpreting 35 U.S.C. §102 in consideration of the claims of the present application.
There is considerable discussion herein on the use of transponders and coded transmitters. This is a fertile area for invention and it is contemplated that future patent applications related to this one will cover many of these inventions. In the meantime, the disclosures of the following U.S. patents and U.S. patent application publications constitute some of the key implementations of such coded transponders and transmitters: U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,917,423, 6,229,988, 7,106,211, 7,511,606, 7,536,169, 7,561,102, 7,664,462, and 20100277296.
Definitions in the Background of the Invention section of any of the above-mentioned applications are also generally, but not restrictively, applicable herein.